


Into Eternity

by certain_as_the_sun



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-30
Updated: 2017-03-30
Packaged: 2018-10-11 05:39:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10456491
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/certain_as_the_sun/pseuds/certain_as_the_sun
Summary: Idril, at Aredhel's death.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Idril is one of those characters I have never been able to like. Blame it on that "darkness in Maeglin" line. Excuse me, Idril, but he just left the only home he knew, lost both parents, found himself in a strange city with a strange culture and a language he probably didn't speak fluently, and he was surrounded by people he'd never met. _Of course_ there's darkness in him; he's grieving and lost and...
> 
> Anyway, I don't like Idril. Writing a story from her point of view was an attempt to make me like her more. It didn't work.

Aredhel's skin is clammy. Idril clutches her aunt's hand and tries not to think of Elenwë, of the Elves who went to sleep during the crossing and never woke up. Absently she notices the candle burning low. She will have to call for a new one before long.

"Don't let them kill him." Aredhel's words are slurred, as if she's been drinking. It's the first she's spoken all night.

"Who, aunt?"

"Eöl. My husband. Don't kill him."

Idril thinks of the Dark Elf locked in the dungeons and shudders. This is all his fault, and her aunt doesn't want him dead?

"Itarillë." A note of command creeps into Aredhel's voice. "Promise me."

Idril strokes her fingers over the back of her aunt's hand. The veins are black and clearly visible beneath the pallor of her skin.

"I promise I will try," she says. Aredhel is dying. The least she can do is to fulfill her last wish.

The candle burns ever lower. It casts strange shadows on the wall. If Idril was of a more morbid turn of mind, she might say they resemble the Helcaraxë, or Námo's throne.

"Where is Lómion?"

Idril suppresses her grimace. Lómion. Her cousin is living proof of how marred the world is, of how that Dark Elf forced her aunt into marriage.

"He's outside."

"Bring him in. I want to see him."

She gets up and goes to the door. Lómion is where she left him, curled up in a corner of the windowsill, hugging his knees to his chest.

"You can come in now."

He stares at her with wide black eyes - the Dark Elf's eyes. An icy chill runs down Idril's spine. _It was a mistake to let him into the city,_ she thinks.

She doesn't hear what Aredhel and Lómion say. She remains in the doorway until Aredhel calls her over.

"Is there anything you want me to tell your mother?" she says, with a ghost of her old cheerful grin.

Idril tries to speak. She finds she can't.

"Tell her..." she begins, then stops.

Aredhel's smile is frozen, her chest still, and Idril knows. She knows before Lómion gives a keening wail and buries his face in his arms. Idril turns away. There is a gaping wound in her fëa where only a moment before she could sense Aredhel, but she is the Princess of Ondolindë. She will hold back her tears until there is no one to see.

Lómion either doesn't know or doesn't care that members of the royal family should not cry in front of other Elves. His body shakes with the force of his sobs. Against her will Idril is reminded of herself after Elenwë's death, when Turukáno was in no state to look after her. She had Uncle Findekáno, Aredhel and Uncle Arakáno to take care of her; who does Lómion have? His Moriquendi father, locked in the dungeon? Turukáno? ...Idril herself?

She dismisses the thought. She was a child. Lómion is, if not an adult, old enough to take care of himself.

The candle gutters out, and Lómion's sobs are the only sound.


End file.
